Category: Home Healthcare Agencies

Optonome is an easy to use mobile application and can be used for communication, training or management. Optonome allows home healthcare agencies to reduce risk and afford value-based healthcare. Without the risk of abuse, fraud or neglect, home healthcare agencies can receive more referrals, pay staff more per hour and create affordable housing opportunities for those in need. Home healthcare agencies can easily sign up and hire certified direct support professionals (DSP) no matter the location and as a result, afford to offer incentives to new referrals.

We have been in development since 2013 testing novel ways for you to go paperless and provide value-based quality healthcare.

Optonome is for:

Healthcare Agencies supporting individuals with autism, intellectual disabilities, physical disabilities, seniors, or even veterans in their home, community or workplace.

Families who support loved ones with health care needs.

Direct Support Professionals (DSP)looking to advance in the healthcare field while receiving a living wage. DSP are guided and trained from no experience to offer value-based medical or non-medical healthcare services in a home or community setting.

Skilled Healthcare professionals such as nurses, therapists, specialist, pharmacists, and doctors credentials are quickly verified to support healthcare agencies in their community.

All users can follow the simple step by step instructions to get started after registration.

View dashboard and main features including courses, channels, and settings.

You can search for channels you create, are invited to or join or available to the public. You can only access a channel based on the type of the channel outlined when creating a channel and role. ex. If the channel type is HIPAA compliant you can only access based on the location specified for that channel. After accessing the channel screen you can view the left curtain by clicking the top left corner as shown in Fig. 1.

Fig. 1

After accessing the left curtain click on the “search channel input area to type the desired channel name as shown in Fig. 2.Fig. 2

As you type you will see search results of channels matching your inputted text as shown in Fig. 3. Select the desired channel and you may view channel history based on the channel type.

As documented in 6400.15,a self-assessment of each home serving eight or fewer individuals, within 3 to 6 months prior to the expiration date of the agency’s certificate of compliance, to measure and record compliance.

The licensing inspection instrument for the community homes is offered by the department to measure compliance. A copy of the self-assessment results and a written summary of corrections made shall be kept by the agency for at least 1 year.

Ongoing monitoring of each home is essential to the health and safety of residents. In an effort to keep you in compliance the self-inspection tool can easily be filled out using Optonome (See Fig. 1). With Optonome you are able to do more self-assessments and be in compliance at all times!

As documented in 6400.14, abuse of an individual is prohibited. Abuse is an act or omission of an act that willfully deprives an individual of rights or human dignity or which may cause or causes actual physical injury or emotional harm to an individual, such as striking or kicking an individual; neglect; rape; sexual molestation, sexual exploitation or sexual harassment of an individual; sexual contact between a staff person and an individual; restraining an individual without following the requirements in this chapter; financial exploitation of an individual; humiliating an individual; or withholding regularly scheduled meals.

Ongoing monitoring of abuse can be difficult when using paper or other traditional methods. Current passive systems rely on the actual user to document themselves as the abuser which very rare. With Optonome, providers are able to use real-time sensor data to compare actual behaviors of all known direct care workers, friends, family members, advocates or the general public in the vicinity of the resident without requiring any documentation of abuse.

Such behavioral information can be used to proactively document incidents and document reportable and non-reportable incidents required time frames.

Searching channel history is easy! As you document more and more data there will be a need to find specific information based on what you remember what was said, a specific form or date range. Here is how you find what you are looking for:

Step 1 – While in channel click on the magnifying glass in the top right corner of the channel

Proper nutrition monitoring in community homes is essential to ensure the ongoing health of residents and reduce incidents. Proactive systems are needed for licensed providers as well as families and non-licensed providers. Optonome allows anyone to easily manage the nutrition of someone with disabilities based on state regulations making sure the right person is alerted before an incident occurs or out of compliance.

With Optonome, you can easily document, delegate tasks and monitor ongoing compliance regulations with our customized forms and channels ensuring the health and safety of residents at all times and locations.

As documented and shared by ODP and many other state agencies around the US. Qualitative analysis of incidents and regulatory concerns note five reoccurring conditions that have the potential to impact mortality in the licensed residential settings including:

1. documented history of at least one similar event that had occurred in a similar setting.

2. previous recommendations by medical professionals that may not have been implemented.

3. staff on duty at the time of an incident unfamiliar with the home or residences.

4. inadequate training for staff caring for the participant’s needs.

5. Inconsistencies in the participant’s care plans.

State offices intend to work closely with providers to reduce the likelihood of recurring incidents but risks are high using traditional methods.

Data from ODP reflects the disability profile of individuals in group homes show a greater incidence of behavioral health issues including trauma, mood/anxiety disorder, psychotic disorder and neurodiversity/autism spectrum. With regard to physical disabilities, residents are more likely to have a mobility impairment, dysphagia (swallowing difficulties) and neurological disabilities including low muscle tone and seizures. Health difficulties include higher incidences of diabetes, respiratory fragility, heart disease, and age-related conditions including dementia. The ongoing problems in the industry are known and traditional methods are costing providers time and money.

With Optonome:

Provider administrators and staff are able to document and view current staff clocked in at residential sites and history via their mobile phone or desktop in HIPAA compliant channels helping supervisors easily search and review events, activities, and incidents.

Managers can invite other medical professionals can also document in HIPAA channels to easily share recommendations along with alerts and notifications. Staff, family, and professions can document medical history, new prescriptions and healthcare information to ensure interested partied are notified when and where needed.

Because of the ongoing turnover providers are forced to quickly train and employ staff for immediate service delivery sacrificing thorough isp training and home needs. With Optonome, staff are properly trained staff based on state regulations and offer onsite orientations customized to the needs of the home and individual support plan helping staff be familiar with evacuation routes, locations of first aid items, fire extinguishers, and any other items in the home or residences.

With our built-in learning management, training courses can be customized based on the residents needs to ensure training requirements are met before providing services. The form builder learning management system allows providers to create ongoing quizzes only and on the fly ensuring staff is trained in changes in the ISP and behaviors as needed.

It is very difficult to make sure care plans are updated as needed. Optonome helps providers to document and notify changes in care plans for all team members before they become officially recorded by support coordinators in order to properly train staff and ensure ongoing compliance without the burden of 3rd parties or further incidents.

Electronic Visit Verification (EVV) dates back to 1998 as explained in Wikipedia and was patented and invented by a nurse who also is a technologist, entrepreneur and Home Health Care Consultant and Domain Expert. In 1996 Michelle Boasten, RN designed and created the first clinical documentation information system for Home Health, Home Care, and Hospice . Twenty years later mass adoption of electronic visit verification is underway and smartphones and 4G networks are making it possible. With CMS efforts to fight Medicaid fraud and overpayments, we believe states should have an open system allowing 3rd party vendors like Optonome to continue to build solutions helping providers submit information securely to state’s EVV vendors and allow support professionals, families, advocates and most importantly individuals receive value-based healthcare and assistance in remote locations.

Our founder and CEO, Dennis Dicker, a serial entrepreneur, patent examiner for paperless technologies and computer engineer invests in real estate decided to use his business acumen to serve a disadvantaged population. First he conducted research to select a population that is under-served and faces problems he thinks he can fix. Then he set up a company to serve that population: adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) or Intellectual Disabilities (ID). He then obtained the necessary licensure and insurance certification to provide comprehensive services and 24-hour residential care for Medicaid participants. He closely examined every problem, created technology-enhanced solutions, tested them and perfected them.

One of the enhanced solutions tried and tested includes EVV to help document location information along with any medical-related tasks. Optonome allows anyone to create HIPAA compliant channels and make sure anyone interested in accessing stored medical data are authorized and at a known location. Once in a known location, authorized users are able to access documentation and healthcare history using our easy to use Form builder to document signatures, text, pictures, audio or any other requirement specific for that individual with searching capabilities to find anything. Each time a form is submitted, time, date and location are stamped along with an individuals mood, staff data, and provider information. See Fig. 1 and Fig. 2.

Our form options allow any healthcare provider to quickly create customized EVV forms and push them out to staff in less than 5 minutes! Easily customized for your state! Create an EVV form today and customize to individual support plans and state regulations. With Optonome you can easily set up an individuals receiving services and keep all communication, forms, ongoing documentation, courses completed, proof of compliance, staff information, support plan information, timesheets and location data in a single location.

Here are some suggestions when creating your form based on CMS and state requirements using Optonome (See Fig. 3 and Fig. 4)

Type of service provided

(Use form option “Select” form option giving the staff the ability to select from a list of services to be provided as displayed in ISP)

Individual receiving the service

Information automatically entered by submitting the EVV form in the individual’s channel and/or by adding a “signature” option in the EVV form – See Creating Paperless Forms on adding a signature form option.

After you create a form you can assign the form to a channel to be viewed or completed by someone you invite to the channel Ex. if the channel is a HIPAA type the user will only have access to the form after verification of location or if an invite channel type the user will have access to the form anywhere.

Step 1 – View channel settings of the channel you are interested in assigning the form to as shown in Fig. 1

Fig. 1

Step 2 – View the section titled “Forms Available For The Channel” as shown in Fig. 2

Fig. 2

Step 3 – Click on “Choose a Form to Add” to view or search for available forms on a team as shown in Fig. 3 and select desired form. Click o

Fig. 3

Step 4- After selecting the desired form click on the plus sign next to the form to confirm adding the form to the channel as shown in Fig. 4

Fig. 4

Step 5 – View confirmation of the form added to the channel as shown in Fig 5. Click done to return to the channel.